The removal and handling of relatively small volumes of liquid waste and excess water from building sites including the removal of accumulated water from confined situations such as building footings and other such circumstances presents a unique problem to the building and construction industry. A wide range of heavy duty pumping devices and pumping systems are available for handling the removal and management of large quantities of water or alternatively, very small level pumping devices are also available for the movement and control of small liquid and water spills. However, such prior art pumping devices either involve the use of heavy cumbersome and expensive equipment for the removal of large quantities of water or alternatively, the smaller pumping devices have limitations on pickup depth. Of particular concern to the building industry is the ability to remove excess water and accumulated sludge that can build-up in newly constructed footings and excavation sites following rainfall or inadvertent spillage. The prior art pumping devices available either involve two or more man operations and furthermore, such large scale pumping devices are incapable of completely removing water and liquids in confined or normally inaccessible areas. Accordingly, the problem of concern to the building and construction industry includes the ability to rapidly and efficiently remove accumulated water from newly dug footings and excavations which may be subject to rainfall or other unexpected occurrences.
It will be desirable to provide a lightweight easily manoeuvrable one-person pumping device having the ability to flexibly and readily enter footings and other smaller parts of excavation sites with the ability to remove virtually all excess water from such situations.
Accordingly one object of the invention is to provide an improved pumping device.